Thursday, June 30, 2011

Some Israelis disapprove of her muckraking the Taglit after accepting a junket. Still, the romance of Birthright Israel captivated Kiera Feldman, who recounts her ten days on the 'love incubator' touring Israel's ethnocracy for free in the latest issue of The Nation. (Cue background music: Hava Nagila on the oudh.)

This unapologetically Zionist program originated with lefty Israeli politician Yossi Beilin, better known for the Oslo accords. Over the years, he has attracted deep-pocketed Jews to be godfathers of Birthright. Co-founder Charles Bronfman, the billionaire heir to the Canadian Seagram’s liquor empire, and Sheldon Adelson, the Las Vegas casino king who is the 5th richest American, stand out. Touting Israeli settlers' Ahava Dead Sea products seems to be a sub-plot.

Some excerpts from Feldman's piece:

A new era is dawning for Birthright. What began as an identity booster has become an ideology machine, pumping out not only Jewish baby-makers but defenders of Israel. Or that’s the hope.

'hormonal mifgashim,’”is the promotion— by turns winking and overt —of flings among participants, or between participants and soldiers. “No problem if there’s intimate encounters,” an Israel Outdoors employee told American staffers during training. “In fact, it’s encouraged!” Birthright boasts that alumni are 51 percent more likely to marry other Jews than nonparticipants.

The free trip is framed as a “gift” from philanthropists, Jewish federations and the State of Israel. Far-right Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson is the largest individual donor, having given Birthright $100 million over the past five years. The Israeli government provided Birthright $100 million during the program’s first decade; Prime Minister Netanyahu recently announced another $100 million in government funding. Birthright’s budget for 2011 is $87 million, a number expected to reach $126 million by 2013, enough to bring 51,000 participants to Israel that year alone.

To apply for a Birthright trip, participants need just one Jewish grandparent—and to pass a screening interview. (Practicing a religion other than Judaism is an automatic disqualifier.) After their ten days on Birthright, participants may postpone their return by up to three months to travel in the region, and it is not unheard of for progressives to “birth left” in the West Bank afterward (as I did)— although Birthright policy is that anyone discovered to have a “hidden agenda” of “exploiting” the free trip “to get access to the territories” to promote “non-Israeli” causes can lose her spot. Birthrighters planning anti-occupation activism with the International Solidarity Movement have been dismissed.

“Welcome home” is a predominant message, a reference to the promise of instant Israeli citizenship for diaspora Jews under the 1950 Law of Return. (About 17,000 Birthright alumni now live in Israel, according to the Jerusalem Post.) It serves as a pointed riposte to the right of return claimed under international law by the 700,000 Palestinians expelled in 1948 upon the creation of the Jewish state, and their descendants.

My traveling companions were not monsters. Birthright’s overstimulation brings about a deadening of feeling. It’s hard to imagine the suffering of others when you’re having the time of your life. In Tours That Bind, sociologist Shaul Kelner contends that Birthright activities revolve around “fun and good feeling,” meaning “the group’s hedonism is thus one of the most effective checks against a determinedly critical politics.”

It’s pleasure as a medium for Jewish nationalism. In Birthright, dissent is for fun-suckers.

Birthright Israel's raison d'etre is the declining birthrate for secular Israeli Jews. Young Jews from the Diaspora are being invited to bump up the Jewish population figures.

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Motti Posloszny and his wife were fined and given two-year suspended sentences for stealing items from the former Nazi death camp. Gili Cohen reports in Haaretz. Hat tip to Meir Javedanfar for the following:

"He said he made a mistake," one official said. "I don't know what would come over a man to make him steal from Auschwitz. It's completely insane."

"It's very sad - for him, for his family and for the municipality," the official added. "This is the largest department in Herzliya; it has everything. This is inconceivable."

Posloszny returned to Israel on Sunday after having spent a night in a Polish jail. He and his wife were fined and given a two-year suspended sentence; the Polish prosecutor said the fine would be used to help preserve exhibits at the camp, which now serves as a museum. Posloszny could not be reached for comment yesterday.

According to Reuters, the couple stole nine items - including spoons, knives, scissors and porcelain bottle stoppers - from a warehouse where the personal effects seized from prisoners at the former Nazi camp are stored. They were arrested at the Krakow airport with the items in their possession.

Saturday, June 18, 2011

A Rabbinical court has ruled that the mean spirit of a secular lawyer who insulted judges 20 years ago was transferred into the body of a stray dog, reports Ynet news! This article caused a bit of headscratching among lawyers who haven't yet been reincarnated as canines. Ridiculous? PETA activists and their ilk don't think so and have unleashed their own flurry of protests. When the international press began drawing comparisons to Sharia courts and medieval justice to pariahs, many Israelis cringed. (The actions of Black Hats often seem barking mad to outsiders.)

A Jerusalem rabbinical court recently sentenced a wandering dog to death by stoning. The cruel sentence stemmed from the suspicion that the hound was the reincarnation of a famous secular lawyer, who insulted the court's judges 20 years ago.

Several weeks ago, according to the Behadrei Hadarim website, a large dog entered the Monetary Affairs Court near the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Mea Shearim. The dog scared the court's visitors and, to their surprise, refused to leave even after they attempted to drive him away.

One of the judges suddenly recalled that about 20 years ago, a famous secular lawyer who insulted the court was cursed by the panel of judges, who wished that his spirit would move on to the body of a dog (considered an impure animal by Halacha). The lawyer passed away several years ago.

Still offended, one of the judges sentenced the poor animal to death by stoning, recruiting the neighborhood's children to carry out the order. Luckily, the dog managed to escape.

The head of the court, Rabbi Avraham Dov Levin, denied that the judges had called for the dog's stoning. But one of the court's managers confirmed the report to Yedioth Ahronoth.

"It was ordered by the rabbis because of the grief he had caused the court," he said. "They didn't issue an official ruling, but ordered the children outside to throw stones at him in order to drive him away. They didn't think of it as cruelty to animals, but as an appropriate way to 'get back at' the spirit which entered the poor dog."

Jerusalem City Council Member and social activist Rachel Azaria sent an urgent letter to the attorney general, calling on him to "deal with the criminals". The Let the Animals Live organization filed a complaint with the police against Rabbi Levin.

Hat tip to Akiva Novick of Ynet News for this pieceUPDATE: The BBC now reports the court's denial of this dog death order, which achieved considerable coverage in the world press. "There is no basis for abuse of animals from the side of Jewish Halacha [law]," the rabbis said in a statement carried by Maariv news: "A dog had entered the court and been removed". Intrestingly, there was no denial that a noisome lawyer had been cursed by the court.

Friday, June 03, 2011

This famous Untitled piece by Adi Nes, recently on display at the Israel Museum, cheekily references Da Vinci's 'The Last Supper.' Here, secular Israeli soldiers eat in an IDF cafeteria, and if this turns out to be their last meal, there is no real sense of their impending deaths. (We can't quite discern the feelings of the po-faced chap dead centre.) A New York art blogger, KMK mused that Nes's image evokes 'The Silver Platter', a poem by Nathan Alterman, posted below.

Personally, I prefer the pop icon Last Supper, with Marilyn as Jesus and Clark Gable as her Judas Iscariot, which is often on display in a gallery window on King David street and reproduced on posters everywhere. In fact, there are myriad commercial permutations of this rather lame idea, ranging from Lego brick renditions to The Last Happy Meal!

The Silver Platter

by Nathan Alterman(Translated from the Hebrew by David P. Stern)

...And the land will grow still Crimson skies dimming, misting Slowly paling again Over smoking frontiers

As the nation stands up Torn at heart but existing To receive its first wonder In two thousand years

As the moment draws near It will rise, darkness facing Stand straight in the moonlight In terror and joy

...When across from it step out Towards it slowly pacing In plain sight of all A young girl and a boy

Dressed in battle gear, dirty Shoes heavy with grime On the path they will climb up While their lips remain sealed

To change garb, to wipe brow They have not yet found time Still bone weary from days And from nights in the field

Full of endless fatigue And all drained of emotion Yet the dew of their youth Is still seen on their head

Thus like statues they stand Stiff and still with no motion And no sign that will show If they live or are dead

Then a nation in tears And amazed at this matter Will ask: who are you? And the two will then say

With soft voice: We-- Are the silver platter On which the Jews' state Was presented today

Then they fall back in darkness As the dazed nation looks And the rest can be found In the history books.

Answer a fool according to his folly

Click here for writer Israel Shamir's point by point Answer to a Jewish Chain Letter...one of those annoying screeds that brandish Jewish claims to the Palestinian territories.

otherwise occupied

Israeli Settlements

Homes in Judea and Samaria riddle the West Bank

Atheists on the bus - one way to eliminate Holy Wars. But godlessness is not an option for many people in our part of the world.

Glib Clips

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RULES OF THE GAME

Rule #1: In the Middle East, it is always the Palestinians that attack first, and it's always Israel who defends itself. This is called "retaliation".

Rule #2: The Palestinians are not allowed to kill Israelis. This is called "terrorism".

Rule #3: Israel has the right to kill Palestinian civilians; this is called "self-defense", or "collateral damage".

Rule #4: When Israel kills too many Palestinian civilians, the Western world calls for restraint. This is called the "reaction of the international community".

Rule #5: Palestinians do not have the right to capture Israeli military, not even 1 or 2.

Rule #6: Israel has the right to capture as many Palestinians as they want (over 10,000 to date being held without trial). There is no limit; there is no need for proof of guilt or trial. All that is needed is the magic word: "terrorism".

Rule #7: When you say "Hamas", always be sure to add "supported by Hezbollah, Syria and Iran".

Rule #8: When you say "Israel", never say "supported by the USA, the UK, European countries and even some Arab regimes", for people (God forbid) might believe this is not an equal conflict.

Rule #9: When it comes to Israel, don't mention the words "occupied territories", "UN resolutions", "Geneva conventions". This could distress the audience of Fox, CNN, etc.

Rule #10: Israelis tend to speak better English than Arabs. This is why it is called "balanced journalism".

Kudos for israelity bites

Time Magazine's Middle East blog cites israelity bites as "a personal favorite" , while the London Times and slate.com have linked to our recent scoops. Even got a plug from the Libertarian Popinjay of Las Vegas:)"a Middle Eastern website called 'Israelity Bites'. Brilliant! Comedians could learn from this url." And ironhead posted, "
If Israelitybites the blog says it, then I believe.LOL.The truth is out there..." Sarcastic? You be the judge.

entering Israel

According to Human Rights Watch (HRW), which cited statistics from the Israeli human rights organization Yesh Din, between 2000 and 2008, "Israeli soldiers in the Occupied Palestinian Territories killed more than 2,000 Palestinian civilians not involved in combat. Of 1,246 criminal investigations initiated during the same period into suspected offenses of all kinds by soldiers against Palestinian civilians, only 6 percent (78 cases) resulted in indictments. Only 13 of those indictments charged soldiers with killing civilians. As of September 2008, five soldiers had been convicted for the deaths of four civilians"

Like it?

Gush Shalom

subversive text? click to see

Talking Points

AA./ “I think that we’ve had an invented Palestinian people, who are in fact Arabs, and were historically part of the Arab community. And they had a chance to go many places.” The Palestinian Authority has “an enormous desire to destroy Israel.” --Newt Gingrich

A./ "The UN was born of the ashes of the Holocaust and so was Israel... we have a lot in common." Chris Gunness, UNWRA

B./ “I don’t often spend the night in Jerusalem. I’ll go professionally or to see friends. It is hyperactive. Everyone is expecting something, either the messiah or disaster or both. Tel Aviv is becoming more and more Mediterranean, like the South of France, whereas Jerusalem is moving in the direction of, I don’t know where, maybe like Qum, in Iran.” --author Amos Oz in the New Yorker.

C./ "We’ll make a pastrami sandwich of them. We’ll insert a strip of Jewish settlements in between the Palestinians, and then another strip of Jewish settlements right across the West Bank, so that in 25 years, neither the United Nations, nor the U.S.A, nobody, will be able to tear it apart.” Ariel Sharon to Winston S. Churchill III in 1973.

D./The world will judge the Jewish state by the way it will treat the Arabs." --Chaim Weizmann, father of modern Zionism.

E./"Obama and I don't just share a home state. We also share exotic names that were given to us by our fathers--Barack, which in Swahili means 'blessed,' and Rahm, which, roughly translated from Hebrew, means 'go screw yourself.'"--Rahm Emanuel, WHite House CHief of Staff

G./ "Israel is the country of immigrants and refugees, survivors and displaced people from all over the world. We weren't occupiers, and we didn't want to be occupiers. We were thrown into a historic situation that we have not managed to get out of. We are a torn nation. The occupation is destroying us. We have no right to control another nation. Our leaders and the leaders of the Palestinian people must do everything to get out of this situation." --Eli Amir, Israeli author

H./"It isn't easy to love Israel and it isn't easy to be a friend of Israel. I must personally admit that I love Israel even when I can't stand it. It's no coincidence that during a year when it's tough to love Israel, it's easier to love its literature. Israeli literature delivers the bill to the Israeli people - for the subjugation of the Palestinians, the occupation, the wars, the internal social injustices, book after book, creation after creation." --Amoz Oz, novelist

I./ "My message to the international community is that our silence and complicity, especially on the situation in Gaza, shames us all. It is almost like the behaviour of the military junta in Burma ."--Desmond Tutu, Nobel Laureate

J./ Sticker on a tour bus in Jerusalem filled with American Jews: "No one belongs here more than you!"

K./ "My pet peeve is nuclear war."-- Dick Cavett

L./ “People say to me, "What about Gaza? Don't have so much compassion for them, don't tell the Israelis to be nice there, tell [the Palestinians] to be nice there. And I say Gaza is a nightmare, and it's a stain on my conscience. And I'm very troubled by the attitude of Israelis against Israeli Arabs. It's a shame. It's a black hole in my democracy.”--Avram Burg

M./"My grandmother was ill in bed when the Naziscame to her home town of Staszow. A German soldier shot her dead in her bed. My grandmother did not die to provide cover for Israeli soldiers murdering Palestinian grandmothers."-- Sir Gerald Kaufman, British MP and Orthodox Jew.

N./ Hamas is regularly described as 'Iranian-backed Hamas, which is dedicated to the destruction of Israel. One will be hard put to find something like 'democratically elected Hamas, which has long been calling for a two-state settlement in accord with the international consensus' -- blocked for over 30 years by the US and Israel, which flatly and explicitly reject the right of Palestinians to self-determination. All true, but not a useful contribution to the Party Line, hence dispensable.--Noam Chomsky

O./ He shall judge between many peoples, and shall arbitrate between strong nations far away; they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. Micah 4:3

P./ Purple, The Color.Author Alice Walker, from Gaza with Code Pink, says:"It's very important that they understand what is happening, and that we hold our own administration accountable.I feel that what is happening in the Middle East is very important because the situation is so volatile. "I love people, and I love children and I feel that the Palestinian child is just as precious as the African-American child, as the Jewish child."

Q./"There are of course Jews who are non-Zionists and even anti-Zionists. The ultra-Orthodox cult of Neturei Karta and the leftist cult of Noam Chomsky are notable examples. The former rejects any earthly attempt to interfere with God's messianic plan, while the latter abhors all forms of nationalism, especially successful ones." --Judea Pearl

R./ "There are two sides in the Middle East conflict: Jews and Arabs who want compromise, and Jews and Arabs who want to demonize and eradicate their neighbors." --Rob Eshman, the editor of LA's the Jewish Journal

S./ "There hasn't been a single Israeli government that has curbed illegal colonization of the West Bank. I have a hard time believing the "center" of Israeli politics is anything other than a black hole -- an event horizon beyond which no light can ever shine outward. All it does is keep sucking more into it and crushing it." --chaos 4700 on HuffPo

U./ "The Middle East is the worst place in which to set loose a military force even partly informed by Christian Zionism, seeing the state of Israel as God's instrument for ushering in the Messianic Age - damning Muslims, while defending Jews for the sake of their eventual destruction...Unbound Christian zealotry is inimical to the prudent use of force...made blind by faith." --James Carroll

V./ Palestinians shoot themselves in the foot and then Israel shoots them in the other foot because they fired first.-- Avi, a blogger

W./ "This was not a love boat, this was a boat of hate," Bibi Netanyahu said of the Turkish ferry, Mavi Marmara, raided by Israeli commandos.

X./ "The number of murders per capita is a third of that of the United States. Israel’s population has passed 7.5 million, more than nine times what it was at its birth in 1948, and is growing at 1.8 percent a year, a rate no other developed country approaches." --Ethan Bronner, NY Times

Y./ Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak to commandos involved in the flotilla raid when he visited them at their base in Atlit: "We live in the Middle East, in a place where there is no mercy for the weak and there aren't second chances for those who don't defend themselves."

Z./"Israel goes to sleep with memories of the Holocaust and wakes up to the Arab-Israeli conflict." Maxim

AA./ "In 1974 US foreign aid amounted to about 25 percent of Israeli gross domestic product (GDP). The aid has continued at roughly the same level, but given the massive growth of the Israeli economy, it now amounts to about 2.5 percent of Israeli GDP." George Friedman, Stratfor. That's alot of shekels!

BB./ "Why doesn't Netanyahu get it over with?Remove the Star of David and blue bars from the Israeli flag and hoist up the Jolly Roger. Piracy pays." - Stanley Heller

CC./ "Apparently, the line you take on Israel trumps everything else in life.” Tony Judt

DD./ "Most Israelis were not transplanted latter-day agrarian socialists but young, prejudiced urban Jews who differed from their European or American counterparts chiefly in their macho, swaggering self-confidence, and access to weapons." --Tony Judt

EE./ "The Israeli policy of amimut, or opacity, prohibits acknowledging the existence of the country’s nuclear arsenal, which consists of more than 100 weapons, mainly two-stage thermonuclear devices, capable of being delivered by missile, fighter-bomber, or submarine (two of which are said by intelligence sources to be currently positioned in the Persian Gulf)." --Jeffrey Goldberg

FF./"Why should a bourgeois country be the world’s foremost recipient of foreign aid, with $3 billion a year from the United States? Why [does] Israel keep schnorring money from Diaspora Jews, and why [do] Diaspora Jews keep handing it over?”--Larry Derfner

GG./ "Many students of Jewish descent, myself included, conclude after majoring in Middle Eastern studies that Israel's post-1967 conduct and its attempt to paint its own colonialist ambitions as a universal Jewish concern constitute an affront to Jewish values and a chillul Hashem." --Evan Sholle

HH./ "We operate everywhere where we can hit terror infrastructure - in close places and in places further away." --Ehud Olmert

II./ "Israeli religious extremists demand American protection and then denounce the U.S. for 'interference' if we demur politely about colonization of the West Bank. " Christopher Hitchens